When the coronavirus first spread around the world, emissions-tracking organizations reported good news: the drop in industrial activity and oil and gas drilling had resulted in lower emissions of a range of harmful chemicals. Yet despite this drop, emissions of one chemical continued to grow, unabated—and even increased. Big Oil has made ambitious pledges about methane emissions but this will not be enough to solve the problem. A recent report by data analytics company Kayrros revealed that global methane emissions grew by as much as 32 percent over the first eight months of 2020 compared with the same period a year ago. These emissions resulted from an increase in methane leaks, whose source is almost invariably the oil and gas extraction and transportation industry. “Such increases in methane emissions are concerning and in stark contradiction to the direction set in the Paris Agreement of 2015,” said the president of […]